Cllr Diarmaid Ward rightly recognises how people are suffering during the current cost-of-living crisis, so I welcome that he has extended the deadline to the end of May for low income, working households to apply for £250 one-off grants, from the Council’s Hardship Fund (‘Help available at this time of crisis’). The scheme’s direct payments are well underway to households receiving benefits, but the extension was required because less than 10% of the ‘first come, first served’ bid money had been claimed by its original cut-off date.
Not long ago the government had to pull the plug on its £2 billion Green Homes Grant scheme when it only managed to get 6% of the money out to people who urgently needed it, to make their homes warmer and more energy efficient. It would be a shame if our Labour council’s equally worthwhile £1 million Hardship Fund suffered a similar fate, because Islington can’t work out how to get the money out to people who need it so desperately. Eligible households can apply for the grant at islington.gov.uk/benefits-and-support/cost-of-living-support/hardship-fund. Hopefully Cllr Ward will find enough ways to publicise the scheme to ensure all the grants are taken up.
Cllr Ernestas Jegorovas-Armstrong, Green Party, Highbury ward